Facts About School Nutrition

Lawton Chiles Middle School © The Pew Charitable Trusts

Lawton Chiles Middle School in Seminole County, Florida, offers students an enticing variety of healthy options as they walk through the lunch line.

Meals and snacks sold in schools are getting healthier, thanks in part to updated nutrition standards that Congress requested in the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. More than 90 percent of districts nationwide are meeting stronger standards for school lunches, supporting student health with more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains and fewer foods high in calories, salt, and fat. Similar improvements are coming in the 2014-15 school year to snacks and beverages sold in vending machines, school stores, a la carte lines, and snack bars.

Browse the resources below to get the facts about school nutrition standards and how they contribute to students’ health.

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School Lunches Are Getting Healthier

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School Lunches Are Getting Healthier

More than 30 million American children eat school lunches each day, and these meals are healthier than ever. See how school lunches have changed.

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School meal programs
School meal programs
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Five Facts About School Meal Programs

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More than 30 million students—about 3 in 5 schoolkids—participate daily in the National School Lunch Program (NSLP), even though many of them and their families may not realize it. Created by Congress in 1946, the NSLP helps pay for 5 billion healthy lunches served each year in 95 percent of public schools and thousands of private ones too.

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Issue Brief

Healthy School Lunches Improve Kids’ Habits

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Issue Brief

Schools can serve healthy lunches, but whether kids will eat them is a question that has been asked often since the 2012-13 school year, when districts across the United States raised the nutritional quality of meals to meet updated national standards.

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